An LCD or other electronic display is typically made of a top plate and a bottom plate with image-generating medium contained between the plates within a peripheral seal, and with electronics connected to the image-generating medium from the edges. The electronics control the image-generating medium through a matrix of row and column lines (in some displays with distributed electronics) and cause an image to appear by means of the electro-optical phenomenon of the material used in the image-generating medium. Each plate may include several layers of dissimilar materials, such as glass, plastics, polarizers, filters, compensators, optical coatings, electrical coatings, electronic circuits, adhesives, etc.
It has been suggested that a premanufactured display, e.g., a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) LCD, may be reduced in size by cutting the display at a desired location, resealing the portion to be saved, reestablishing the electronics as necessary, and reestablishing and/or enhancing the polarizer and/or other layers of the plates as necessary. Exemplary methods for resizing LCDs are described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,204,906 (“the '906 Patent”), which names the same inventor as the inventor of the present application. The entire disclosure of the '906 Patent is expressly incorporated by reference herein.
To separate a desired portion of a completed display from an excess portion of the display, the many layers of the display must be completely severed. Before cutting the glass plates of a display, it has been suggested to remove a strip of the overlying plastic layers (e.g., polarizers, filters, etc.) to access the underlying layers, particularly the glass plates themselves. To remove this strip, two cuts are made along the border between the desired and excess portions, one cut on each side of the intended cut line. The strip between the two cut lines may then be peeled away to expose the next layer to be cut, e.g., to expose the surface of the underlying glass plate. Alternatively, the overlying layers (e.g., polarizers, filters, etc.) may be removed entirely from the plates and replaced after the glass plates (or other layers) are cut, although this may increase the cost of the resized display and/or risks changing the performance and durability of the display.